Zionism/Israel explores the tension between a European political and intellectual movement and the state that emerged from it. This section focuses on Zionism as a reservoir of ideas, controversies, and disagreements about exile, sovereignty, democracy, and justice, and on Israel as a concrete political reality, with its institutions, conflicts, and social transformations. The aim is neither to dissolve the state into the narrative of the movement, nor to reduce the movement to the policies of the governments of the moment. By holding these two aspects together, it becomes possible to read Israeli politics in the light of the resources of Zionism – and, conversely, to test Zionism against the historical experience of the state, as well as the current transformations in the conditions of Jewish life in the diaspora.
